


turn west towards dawn

by unthank



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emails, Epistolary, Ex friends with benefits, Friends With Benefits, Getting Together, Late 20s, Light Angst, M/M, Post-Time Skip, Tentative Friends to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-17 16:55:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29353815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unthank/pseuds/unthank
Summary: There's consequences for falling for someone you made a pact to never love, Osamu knows this. He's here in Italy to try and forget. But what does it mean when the man he tried to leave behind opens every door he promised to close?
Relationships: Miya Osamu/Suna Rintarou
Comments: 7
Kudos: 70
Collections: SunaOsa Valentine's Exchange





	turn west towards dawn

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inflame](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inflame/gifts).



> [ _it's been a while since i have even heard from you_ ](https://open.spotify.com/track/0ug5NqcwcFR2xrfTkc7k8e?si=EKjiCu2NQFO-xo-FUjWbOg)
> 
> cw: sexual content in part three (july 22nd)

####  **sunday. july 20th. 2025.**

There’s 5898 miles between Osamu and his past. 

Moving to Verona was a decision made between finding his future and building his present; sake and late night phone calls with his twin brother aside, everything he had done was for the best. Why else would he move so far away from home?

He wasn’t here permanently, he had to remind Atsumu regularly. Italy has good food and eating well is his business, there’s only so much he can do with the rice he learned to make at home under their mother’s watchful eye. He wants to try something new. He wants to expand his horizons beyond the shop he’d opened in his early twenties and have _something_ that astounded the people back home. There’s no way he was about to let Atsumu take every bit of recognition meant for them both.

Verona was small enough he didn’t feel overwhelmed, but big enough he was able to hide in his daily routines, often forgetting he still had a life back home in Japan. The summer colours in the _piazza_ and the loud laughter that rang around his apartment building never failed to make him smile. It was different enough here that he could try to forget.

He hated the weekends for that reason. 

Sundays were quieter than back home in Japan; every shop shut and everyone he knew was at home, resting, taking care of their families or observing traditions he didn’t hadn’t managed to fully understand. He was left here with his thoughts, his memories. Everything Osamu came here to escape.

It was between these thoughts and his fifth cup of coffee that day when his laptop, usually left on silent, lit up and made a noise he usually only heard from other businesses. What business would be emailing him at 3pm on a Sunday here in Italy — 11pm Japan time? It must be someone particularly desperate to know onigiri as he did.

He sat at the table, entered his password, and waited for his laptop to load. He should probably invest in a new one, soon, he mused to himself, he’d had this one since he first opened a permanent Onigiri Miya branch in Osaka, almost 6 years ago. It was a gift, a promise of support, one he knew now was false.

But it wasn’t the time to dwell on the past — Sunday blues or not.

Finally, his email app opened, blue light against white and Osamu, tired though he was, sat still. Frozen. He knew what he’d expected, business emails or old family pictures sent by his mother, but not this. He’d never expected to see that name again.

On the screen, the sender’s name seemed to taunt him. _Suna Rintarou_.

Tentatively, with more hesitation than he was usually able to possess, he clicked on it. Half afraid it was some kind of sick joke. Half afraid that it was real.

> **Suna Rintarou**
> 
> **Sun 20/7/2025 2:59 PM**
> 
> **To:** Miya Osamu
> 
> **Subject:** Hey
> 
> _Hey._
> 
> _It’s been a while._
> 
> _Atsumu told me you’re out in Italy, and I don’t have your Line or phone number anymore. So sorry for the email, I feel like I’m back in middle school typing this on my phone, but I had no other way to contact you._
> 
> _It’s taken me awhile to get the courage to actually type and send this. I guess I’m still a coward, huh?_
> 
> _Onigiri Miya is still open, I see. That’s great. Though who’s running it with you all the way in Europe of all places? I don’t think I really deserve an answer to that, do I? Not after everything back then. I know that sounds like I’m looking for some sort of sympathy or answer, or you to say that I shouldn’t beat myself up, but I really don’t mean that. Not anymore. I think i’ve grown a lot in the past few years. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t be emailing you._
> 
> _I just wanted to say I’m sorry for everything. It’s late, I know, probably too late. But I think of you often and I just hope you’re living the best life you can. I know I was an asshole back then. There isn’t really an excuse for how I acted._
> 
> _But yeah. I miss you. I hope everything is going well._
> 
> _Rin_

Osamu wasn’t sure he could move.

####  **monday. july 21st. 2025.**

> **Miya Osamu**
> 
> **Mon 21/7/2025 6:44 PM**
> 
> **To:** Suna Rintarou
> 
> **Subject:** Re: Hey
> 
> _Suna,_
> 
> _Apologies for the late reply, I was busy all day._
> 
> _It’s been a long time._
> 
> _I don’t have my Japanese phone turned on at the moment, since I’m in Italy. I can’t believe ‘Tsumu told you where I was. Though he’s never been able to keep his mouth shut, so I'm not really surprised at all. I won’t comment on you being a coward._
> 
> _My mom and cousin (Isamu, I don’t know if you remember him) are running it while I’m here taking culinary classes. Onigiri Miya won’t know what hit it when I’m back._
> 
> _You’ve always been good at beating yourself up over shit. But at least you’ve learned how to apologise._
> 
> _It is going well. I hope your volleyball career is working out._
> 
> _Best wishes,_
> 
> _Osamu._

  
  


####  **tuesday. july 22nd. 2025.**

They’d been 20 and 21 respectively when everything first started, Osamu remembered. He’d opened his first store, in a quiet area, greener than the rest of their industrial home city, closer to their homeland of near-countryside suburbs than the burnished grey of cityscapes. Everyone had come home to celebrate. Atsumu stayed with their mother, but was up early every day for a week just to help him, their teenage disagreements long buried in the past. Aran visited, too, bringing Akagi and Kita in tow. It seemed to Osamu, who was sure it was still the best day of his life, that his family was far more than just him, his twin, and their proud mother.

Suna had been there as well, hanging back from everyone else like he always had. Back then, Osamu had remembered him saying it was because he’d never truly belong there. He wasn’t born with his feet planted in the same ground they all grew up from — his family were neither here nor there.

 _“We can be a family,”_ Osamu had said. 

Suna had all but smiled.

Osamu remembers, too, later that night, when it was just him and the strange, melancholic boy he’d wanted to kiss since he was sixteen. He’d never dared kiss him before now. But Suna’s lips were against his and he tasted like vanilla vodka and cheap breath mints; Osamu never wanted it to end. 

It started, not to his surprise, with Suna between his legs and his mouth biting at his neck. He didn’t care, it didn’t matter, if someone saw those marks tomorrow, he was more than old enough to have an affair. Despite the bites, Suna was gentle with him. His slender fingers curled deep into Osamu, opening him up and pressing sweet kisses to his temple.

 _“Good boy,”_ he’d whispered to him. _“So good for me, ‘Samu_.”

With a hand slicked with lube and spit from Osamu’s wanton mouth, he’d guided himself closer, lined his cock against prepped, tight muscle and _pushed_. 

It wasn’t anything Osamu hadn’t done before, but he was sure this time was different to all the others. His heart beat ever faster in his chest like it was trying to escape him, telling him _this is it, this is what you’ve been craving._ Suna fucked him deep and slow, with a determination that he’d never known before, like he was trying to get at something that’d always escaped him. _Is this what hidden love is?_

Something warm and heavy burned in the pit of Osamu’s stomach, swelled up until it set his whole body on fire. He was made of cold stone but the sharp, dry ice of Suna’s impassioned kisses melted him into lava. His body was a ravine and the man above him slowly filled it, burned him; he was achingly full and hard as glass, desperate to feel the same as Suna did.

An elegant hand on his own leaking cock and a lazy grind was enough to topple him from the very peak. He’d cascaded apart. Been split apart. He’d never wanted this to end. 

And maybe it was embarrassing to be almost thirty and remembering the first time you had sex with the man who broke your heart, but Osamu didn’t care. Not when that same man and crawled his way into his chest again, sunk his sharp fox-teeth into his heart.

Not when he still hadn’t replied to Osamu’s late email.

 _This was stupid_ , he thought. He knew he shouldn’t have replied at all, just carried on with his life as if Suna had never been a part of it — pretended he’d never fallen in love and that Suna had never found out about it.

He should’ve just left it all alone.

* * *

> **Suna Rintarou**
> 
> **Tues 22/7/2025 8:59 PM**
> 
> **To:** Miya Osamu
> 
> **Subject:** Re: Hey
> 
> _Osamu, hey there._
> 
> _I was surprised to see you emailed me back, I absolutely thought you’d ignore this and tell Atsumu to stay out of both our lives. I’m glad you didn’t. It’s good to hear from you._
> 
> _I remember Isamu, he’s just a few years older than you, right? He seems to be doing a good job, though I’d expect you to only hire the best to look after your baby while you’re away. Culinary classes, huh? That’s really cool. You never needed them to make the best onigiri our side of Amagasaki, maybe even the best in the whole prefecture. You’re still like your brother though. It’s not surprising you want to take everything to bigger places._
> 
> _Atsumu is the same. He’d talk about taking over the world as setter for the national team whenever we trained together. That boyfriend of his looks exhausted._
> 
> _I want to talk about us, about the past, but I’m not sure of what to say. Volleyball just isn’t the same without you around, even just being at the other end of the phone. I’m sorry I never saw that back then. Sorry never fixes a thing, though._
> 
> _I’m still playing with EJP. Komori is still here, but a new guy joined recently. He played for Division 2 until now, a small, snake looking guy but good at what he does. Even if he talks about his wife constantly (who’s a nurse specialising in injuries? I learnt that unwillingly). I still don’t get it._
> 
> _I look forward to hearing from you._
> 
> _Rin_

####  **wednesday. july 23rd. 2025.**

Despite everything he promised to himself, Osamu found that he couldn’t leave his emails alone, just on the off chance he might miss something from Suna. 

And he hid, from himself, the last conversation they’d ever had. The hissed anger and spat poison; Osamu didn’t want to confront the ugly part of them that knew that had been inevitable.

For once he was glad he was alone in another country, no twin or nosy mother to ask him about his personal business. He sure as hell didn’t want them or himself to try to dissect _why_ he was desperate for contact from his ex-friend with benefits — forgetting, purposefully, that he always felt like it was more than that.

> **Miya Osamu**
> 
> **Wed 23/7/2025 10:55 AM**
> 
> **To:** Suna Rintarou
> 
> **Subject:** Re: Hey
> 
> _Of course I emailed you back, I’m not that rude._
> 
> _Italy has a lot of good food. It’s interesting here. Did you know they have their own type of onigiri called_ arancini _? They’re not exactly the same since these are deep fried, but they can have fillings as well. I’m thinking of trying something similar with onigiri as a special when I get back to Japan._
> 
> _I like it here, Rin. It’s good. It’s not home. But it’s good. I can nearly speak the language and it’s a language made for loving cooking, I feel at home when I talk about it here. I got a hang of the volleyball terms here as well. That’s different as well. But it’s nice. Watching the matches on TV stopped me feeling homesick._
> 
> _I don’t really know why I’m telling you all that._
> 
> _I haven’t made many friends here. I’m leaving in a few months, so I guess it doesn’t matter._
> 
> _The past is the past. I fell for you when you said you couldn’t be in a relationship. That doesn’t mean you had to be so mean when I told you and broke everything off. You know I did what was best. But that’s all behind us now._
> 
> _Have fun with the new guy._
> 
> _Osamu_

  
  


####  **thursday. july 24th. 2025.**

> **Suna Rintarou**
> 
> **Thurs 24/7/2025 11:04 AM**
> 
> **To:** Miya Osamu
> 
> **Subject:** Re: Hey
> 
> _‘Samu_
> 
> _I should’ve learned how to communicate. There wasn’t any excuse for me to shout at you when all you did was love me despite the way I was. And I was too… I don’t even know… To see how much you meant to me. You still mean to me._
> 
> _Maybe it’s selfish of me to say this, but I will anyway._
> 
> _If you ever want to try again, to love each other properly and openly, I’m here. I want to try. It’s always been you, ‘Samu._
> 
> _I hope I can try your arancini one day._
> 
> _Yours, always,_
> 
> _Rin_

####  **friday. july 25th. 2025.**

> **Miya Osamu**
> 
> **Fri 25/7/2025 9:33 AM**
> 
> **To:** Suna Rintarou
> 
> **Subject:** Re: Hey
> 
> _I miss you, Rin._
> 
> _I want to cook for you again._

  
  


> **Suna Rintarou**
> 
> **Fri 25/7/2025 9:40 AM**
> 
> **To:** Miya Osamu
> 
> **Subject:** Re: Hey
> 
> _I’ll be there. Valerio Catullo Airport at 8pm your time._
> 
> _Wait for me._

####  **saturday. july 26th. 2025.**

Nothing had made Osamu feel like this before.

There was an electricity buzzing through his bones, striking his joints and making him shiver — threatening to fizzle out. He could run. There was still time. He didn’t have to face his past or an uncertain future.

But he was a Miya, and his wolf-like mother had raised him to confront every difficulty that dared to cross his path; no matter how terrified it made him.

It was getting dark outside. The sun setting on the end of another day, the end of yet another week, deep orange and gold over the cool concrete of the airport. There was something nostalgic about summer sunsets to Osamu. It pulled at his gut, called him back to a time where he had nothing to worry him, where his mouth against a beautiful boy’s was all he wanted the universe to grant him. 

It was the same beautiful boy, now, that Osamu thought of. He wanted, more than anything— desperately— fretfully— for this all to work out. He was so sure it’d break his heart to lose the same boy all over again.

But he’d come all the way here, 5898 from their shared past, to fix the glass that broke between them. Osamu wanted no more than a phone call to lie between them. 

“‘Samu.”

Osamu looked up, away from his phone and into the cool green and false melancholy that stood before him. Rin was taller than he remembered, though he knew that he couldn’t have grown, no late twenties lines or scars from childhood accidents marred his still pretty face. His hair was longer than Osamu remembered, and _God_ he wanted to run his hands through it and pull him close, never to let him run from his side again.

Before he could pull him down and taste his unfathomed kisses, Rin did it first. His mouth crashed against Osamu’s, vanilla and desperation and hope between them. He was older, Osamu was too, but he still kissed him with the feverish desire he’d left as lovebites all those years ago.

When he looked at him again, pressed a kiss to his forehead and entwined his cool-graced hands with hard worked ones, Osamu never wanted this to end.

He thinks, he’s sure, that the miles between his past had ended; the future was built between them, their kisses, and the promise of _arancini_.

**Author's Note:**

> this fic is for [arin](https://twitter.com/inflamist), who i was lucky enough to get as my giftee for this exchange. i felt very blessed knowing we were already mutuals on twitter, so it was fun creating a fic for you.
> 
> this fic went through many stages; at first it was a fwb university au, then it became an exploration, and i finally decided on combining them with an in-canon fic. through writing it, i fell in love with the idea of an email epistolary fic, which is why much of their communication takes places between emails and references to things only each of them know about. it's a glimpse into a week of osamu's life and how he might begin to heal, with suna at his side.
> 
> 1\. the song for this fic is _style_ by taylor swift, please listen along to it while reading! i personally feel like it fits the mood for this fic  
> 2\. while this is a valentines exchange, i set this fic in the summer. sunaosa are the embodiment of lazy, warm summers to me  
> 3\. the distance between verona and amagasaki is 5898 miles  
> 4\. i chose verona because i spent some time there and it's one of my favourite cities. i like to imagine that, the day after suna and osamu reunite, they act like tourists and visit juliet's balcony to write their names on the walls nearby
> 
> thank you so much for reading! i hope you enjoyed this fic arin <3
> 
> [twitter @kuguken](https://twitter.com/kuguken)
> 
> [ko-fi](https://ko-fi.com/heresy)


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